


The stone

by CactusWren



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: All Dialogue, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Mentions of Suicide, Post Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-17
Updated: 2013-07-17
Packaged: 2017-12-20 10:56:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/886437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CactusWren/pseuds/CactusWren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The stone is white.  Not black and tall and stark, like the one now long gone, but small and white and elegant.  Inscribed with the name, “MARY MORSTAN WATSON”, and the dates, and below that, “Wife, friend, healer, giver”.  And John is black, pale face above funeral black such as he did not wear even at Sherlock's grave.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The stone

 

 

“ _Takes strength to grieve – to do it right.”_ – F. M. Busby

 

 

The stone is white and John is black.

The stone is white. Not black and tall and stark, like the one now long gone, but small and white and elegant. Inscribed with the name, “MARY MORSTAN WATSON”, and the dates, and below that, “Wife, friend, healer, giver”. And John is black, pale face above funeral black such as he did not wear even at Sherlock's grave.

It's a strange day at the end of autumn. Cold, with a sharp breeze dragging dead leaves across the dying grass, scraps of windblown cloud crossing the sun so the day is by turns dark and harshly bright. Mary had no family to come to her funeral; but Harry came, and so did Mike. Greg Lestrade, Molly Hooper, Mrs Hudson. Even Mycroft made a brief appearance.

One by one, each clasped John's hand or embraced him or touched his arm, and then walked away. Now there are only three men left at the grave. Lestrade, and a little closer Sherlock, and crouching with a hand on the stone, John. In black.

He's whispering to the stone. Deliberately Sherlock turns his head so the wind is loud in his ears. He still catches fragments of words, deletes them heard but unlistened-to.

After a moment John gets to his feet and approaches them. His limp is worse than it's been in years. “Thanks for coming, Greg,” he says softly. “Mary would have appreciated it. She loved you, you know.”

Lestrade swallows. “I'll call you tomorrow,” he says almost sternly. “Next day at the latest. And you'd better answer.”

John's attempt at a smile is painful to see. “Don't worry.” He pats Lestrade's coat sleeve, as if to comfort _him._

And then there is only John and Sherlock.

For a moment, the only sound is the wind. “You're coming back to Baker Street?” Sherlock says bluntly.

John hesitates, and then shakes his head. “I – can't, Sherlock. Perhaps sometime. But not now.”

“John. I understand that you – need time, that there's a grieving process to be gone through. I won't try to rush you. But – ”

“ _No.”_ John holds up a hand. “Please don't press me on this. Maybe sometime, but _not now._ There's … nothing left. I can't any more.”

He turns away. Sherlock is at his elbow. “John, I – ”

“God _damn_ it!” John whirls on him, then swallows. “I – think you do want to understand. So all right. But for once, just for once in your bloody hyperfluent life, just please _listen_ and do not talk.” His voice is shaking. “Can you do that, are you capable of it?”

Keeping his eyes on John, Sherlock steps back. There's a silence.

John's voice, when he speaks, is low and still not quite steady. He's looking away from Sherlock. “First there was Afghanistan. It was good, and what I was doing was important. Necessary. But – Sherlock, can you understand, I went into medicine with some idea that this was _what a good man did._ But after I'd been over there a while, I began to realise I would have to let go of any notion that I was a good man – no,” he raises a hand, “no, don't say anything! I'd thought, somehow, that I could just instinctively and automatically _be_ good without trying. But I realised that if there even was such a thing as good, then good was something I would have to _do_ – consciously, on purpose, every day – because it wasn't something I could ever just be. Asking for a front-line assignment? A doctor wanting to be surrounded by bullets and bombs and injured men, not because it's the best opportunity to be of service but sweet Jesus because it's _exciting?_ How is that the action, how is that the thought, of a good man?

“And then there was the last day. In the space of an hour – everything. My oath as a soldier, to defend my own. My oath as a doctor, _primum non nocere._ Then one bullet, and both my careers – as a soldier and as a doctor – I lost those too. Everything, in an hour.”

His left shoulder moves in his jacket, as if it's paining him.

“London. Six months. Six months of nothing at all. _Walks._ Appointments with my bloody therapist. Reduced to – ” The sound he makes may be intended for a laugh. “To thinking _pathetically_ maudlin things like 'This is my service weapon, I will not dishonor it by blowing my own brains out with it'. And – ”

He swallows hard. “I just ran into Mike, by accident – I tried to pretend I didn't see him, did I ever tell you that? God. I thought you were mad. Two years, two _glorious_ years. There were times it was a fucking miracle I didn't kill you – that first night, when you held out your hand for my phone because it was easier to text me and drag me across town than to go downstairs and borrow Mrs Hudson's phone, I remember thinking quite calmly 'I could bludgeon him with my stick'. Never deduced that, did you? Two wondrous, terrifying, _infuriating_ years. And then … ”

His voice tails off, and he swallows again. Hesitates, as if searching for expression. “John,” Sherlock's own voice comes out as a whisper, “I am sorry for – ”

“ _Shut up!”_ John blazes at him. “This is not about _forgiveness!_ I know that you had to do what you did, and I've forgiven you, and I _would_ forgive you a dozen times over. But … for half a year afterward there were days when I actually specifically thought, 'Just hold on for one more day, get through today's shift at the clinic, the gun or the bridge or the pills will still be there tomorrow'. My forgiving you won't make that not have happened. And – hell, maybe I am insane, because I still dream of it, and in the dreams sometimes you hit the pavement wearing a helmet and body armour, and other times you're on the roof of Bart's in your bloody coat and scarf but there's a Taliban sniper across the street, or we're not even at Bart's, we're in some London street and you step on an IED – Sherlock, that day made me crazy. It broke something in my brain, and all the forgiveness in the world won't change that.”

The clouds are thickening, now; there are more dark moments than bright ones. The wind has sharpened, yanking at their coats and John's hair. A little long, Sherlock thinks, the way Mary liked it. He remembers seeing her curled in John's chair at 221b, with John on the floor at her feet, and she toyed with his hair as they listened to Sherlock's violin …

“You … came back.” John's voice is almost inaudible. “You did come back and you were _alive,_ and I wondered if God wanted me to believe in Him again. You were back, and there was Baker Street and _everything,_ and – and then there was Mary! You could remember who she was! You _liked_ her, and she admired you, and – I think the moment I should have known was the time she walked into two-two-one-B without even knocking and you said 'Ah, Mary, it's you' and glanced at me as if to say, _See? I can remember this one's name!_ and started talking to her about the case we were working on and actually sounded pleased she was there.

“I remember thinking, right at that moment, _This is the best moment of my life except for all the ones that come after._ Do you know what that is, Sherlock? To really believe that things are perfect and can only get better? But what I should have known was nothing that good and that purely joyous could ever last. God – doesn't love me that much.” The fine-drawn, mobile lips tighten. “Sorry. I get these urges to wallow in self-pity.”

Another silence, John breathing deeply. He doesn't look at Sherlock.

“Sherlock. Listen, because – this is the thing. This life, this so in every way opposite of sane life that you've made, that you and I have made – what's inevitable, what's bound to happen, is that one day one of us won't come back. And if it's you – ” His breathing is unsteady. “A human being has only so much – capacity for loss. I have none left. It's all used up. If I lose you, I will … _cease,_ simply cease to exist, like blowing out a candle.” His voice is shaking, just slightly. “Someday it might … come back, a bit at least. But for now … I can't. Call it self-preservation, or just selfishness. I'm sorry.”

Still not meeting Sherlock's eyes, he turns away. A step, and he cries out in pain. Another – and his right leg _buckles_ under him, as Sherlock has never seen, sending him sprawling face-down on the grass.

Sherlock moves forward, to help him, but Lestrade's hand clutches his coat sleeve.

Not turning, not looking back, John hauls himself to his feet. Flinching at every step, as if putting weight to his right leg is agony, he walks away.

 

* * *

 

The door of 221b is ajar.

Sherlock sees it long before he reaches the top of the stairs. Someone's inside, someone not concerned for hiding his/her presence. Sherlock slows his pace, moves quietly towards the door. Sniffs the air – yes, there's a presence inside the room. Damp wool, shampoo, antibacterial handwash –

_John._

It's been a week and two days since Mary Watson's funeral, and he hasn't seen or spoken to John in that time. Slowly he pushes the door open – and yes, there's a figure huddled in John's chair, caught in the slant of light from the windows. How could he not have seen, not have _observed,_ how grey John's hair has gone over these months of Mary's illness? “John,” he says.

John doesn't turn towards him. “There was nowhere else,” he says, without preamble. “I don't have anywhere else.”

Sherlock only stands in the doorway, lips slightly parted. Searching for words. “There's always here,” he says at last.

Long moments of silence. John hunches forward in his seat. “Sherlock,” his voice is almost inaudible, “will you … keep something for me? Just for a while, until I can – ” He shakes his head. “Just please hold onto it.”

“Of course,” Sherlock says immediately.

There's a small duffel on the floor by John's chair. He opens it and draws out a plastic supermarket bag. Still facing the windows, he hands it to Sherlock.

The weight betrays it immediately, but still Sherlock looks inside. A padded shipping envelope, carefully sealed with multiple layers of tape, and with SHERLOCK written across it. His hands at once identify the outline of John's gun. “Just – for a while,” John says again.

“I'll keep it,” Sherlock promises. “For as long as you need.”

The silence is long enough that Sherlock almost thinks he can see the slant of window-light move across John's body. “John?” he says at last. “Some of the things you said, at Mary's grave. They've … troubled me.”

John doesn't move, doesn't turn from the windows, but Sherlock knows he's listening.

“Your need to – survive, to protect yourself for a time. You called that selfishness. Your anger at me, which I entirely deserve, you called crazy. Your pain at your injuries, hurting for the career you'd lost, your determination not to take your own life – you called that _maudlin._ Your grief for Mary, you called wallowing in self-pity. John – ” He swallows some tension in his throat. “Why are you the only one not allowed to mourn _your_ losses?”

Only now, finally, John moves. His head turns, eyes glancing around the floor as if for something lost. A long shaking inhalation catches in his throat, turning to a series of hitching gasps. His head comes up, not looking at Sherlock, but turning to the ceiling, eyes wide. Suddenly he presses his hands against his mouth, as if to silence himself.

His eyes squeeze shut, and the tears fall.

Sherlock steps forward, only one step. There's a grieving process to be gone through, and he must not interrupt it. He drops to one knee beside the chair. For an instant he thinks to put a hand on John's shoulder, but instead lays it on the arm of the chair. John will sense the vibration, if only on a subliminal level, and be aware of his presence. Will know he's there. As little sense as the phrase _Just be there for me_ may make, Sherlock wants his presence to be known, to be whatever comfort it can be.

If “being there for” another individual can be of any use at all, Sherlock wants to be there for John.

It takes a long time. Sherlock wonders who these tears belong to. Mary, of course, but not only to her: it's as if decades of tears have suddenly been released, weeping choked off and dammed back and forbidden. Tears for John's parents, perhaps. He spoke once of losing a brother when he was in his teens. Those he lost in the Army, patients, friends. Sherlock wonders briefly if one or two of them might belong to Sherlock himself, but dismisses the thought at once. He deserves none of John's tears. Not even those already shed for him.

It's darker in the room when the weeping finally slows and stills. John draws a long breath, lets it out: almost steady. His eyes at last meet Sherlock's. He looks worn, exhausted as Sherlock has never seen him, but there's some beginning of peace in his expression.

Sherlock's fingers barely brush the wool of John's sleeve. Then he goes and switches the kettle on. It's quiet in the flat again, but comfortable, relaxing. Almost like _(—before),_ Sherlock thinks.

As he watches, John almost glances at the stairs – downward flight to the street, upward to his old room. He stops himself, but, “Is it all right – Sherlock, can I – ”

Sherlock speaks at the same moment: “You'll – stay? Please?”

 

 

 


End file.
